


New Year's Eve, 2024

by accol



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: (background Scira), First Kiss, Future Fic, M/M, New Year's Eve, Pining, long term separation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-01
Updated: 2015-01-01
Packaged: 2018-03-04 18:18:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3080243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/accol/pseuds/accol
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles has been away from Beacon Hills for a long time, and Derek has the stars to keep him company.</p>
            </blockquote>





	New Year's Eve, 2024

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nomorerippedfuel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nomorerippedfuel/gifts).



> Originally published on [Tumblr](accol-fics.tumblr.com). Slightly modified.

Derek breathes in the cold night air.  The stars are bright, gleaming down through the quiet of the last night of the year.  He picks out his favorite constellation, the one that is formed of all but one of Ursa Major’s stars.  

It took him the better part of a decade to allow himself to call it Ursa Stilinski… to match the smattering of moles along Stiles’ left cheek.  It's a good match.  Stiles is the fiercest man he knows... knew once.

It is ridiculous and corny and Derek would die before he’d admit to anyone that he pines for a constellation.  Derek wishes on it anyway, for another good year for the pack, for Stiles to come back some day.  Then he zips his coat and walks the mile through the preserve to Scott and Kira’s house.

****

The twins nearly tackle him when he crosses the threshold.  They snarl and bicker and fight for the first hug from Uncle Derek.  

"Isn’t it past bedtime for a pair of five year olds?"

"No way!  Dad said we can stay up ‘til midnight."

"You got to stay up when you were a pup. You said so!  Plus Uncle Stiles is coming!"

Derek flushes hot and hugs them.

****

Kira kisses his cheek hello and hands him a plate for snacks before chasing down the twins to get them into their pajamas.  Scott nods and smiles from his conversation with Isaac and Chris.   

Things are good for the Beacon Hills pack.  Everyone is healthy.  The treaty with the Carson pack in Eugene was sealed on the solstice.  Samuel, Grace, and their pup Bradley are fully part of the pack as of the Harvest Moon.  The Nematon is quiet again.

Things are good.  They are.  Derek _knows_ things are good for everyone.

He shouldn’t be lonely.

****

He hears the tires on the dirt drive before he sees the headlights.  Derek had come out to the porch so that none of the wolves would hear his too-fast heartbeat.  

"Hey!"  Stiles jumps from the rental and closes the distance between them in two loping, hurried strides.  His arms are around Derek before another breath.

Derek presses his nose to the constellation along Stiles’ cheek and breathes in.

"It’s been too long," Stiles says quietly, barely above the thudding of his heart.  "Really.   _Way_ too long."  He pulls Derek impossibly closer and it’s almost enough.

"Too long," Derek echoes.  Four years was far too long and it was past in a moment for how close Stiles is now, warm and solid in his embrace.  He lets himself sink closer, pull Stiles tighter to himself.

Stiles tucks his nose against Derek’s earlobe.  His chest expands in Derek's embrace as he breathes deeply.

And then the front door flies open and children latch onto Uncle Stiles’ legs, dragging him inside the house like a prize from their first hunt.  Stiles’ laugh almost is enough to fill the cooling space left against Derek’s body.

****

Derek has eyes or ears on Stiles all night.  

It had been that way always.  First, because Derek had been skittish, a wounded animal looking for danger from all fronts.  Then, because Stiles was so weirdly, annoyingly fascinating.  Eventually, because Derek could never learn enough about Stiles, or from him.  He didn't want to look away in case he missed something important; an expression, an eyeroll, a word (or seventy, tumbling across each other), a look that said what Derek was hoping.  If they’d been in the same room, Derek had always been hyperaware of Stiles’ movements.  Four years hadn’t changed that.

Time added a few, early-blooming silver strands of hair at Stiles’ temples, some faint creases at the corners of his eyes. Stiles’ motions had slowed to something more rooted and at ease, more confident.

And Derek aches.

****

"Hey," Stiles says again.  It is easier this time, less of a rushed greeting, more of a conversation starter.  "I’m glad you’re here."  His hand circles Derek's bicep.

"Where else would I be?"

Stiles smiles and pinches him.  ”Always difficult, aren’t you?”

Derek opens his mouth to retort, falling into their old rhythm, but Stiles beats him to it.

"It’s part of your charm, I know, I know.  Believe me, I know."  Then his bright smile eases into something more studious.  Stiles’ eyes rake over Derek’s features.  "Always a puzzle."  

And then Melissa and John arrive, and Stiles is pulled away again.

****

It is nearly midnight, and Stiles is there again saying, “Hey.”

A longneck beer dangles from his fingers.  He takes a swallow.  Derek follows the bounce of his adam’s apple.

"Do you have four years of Christmas presents for me?" Stiles asks when he takes the bottle away from his lips.  He sucks a taste of beer off the lower one.

"Yes," Derek says. It’s not really in response to Stiles’ question, though it could be. He’d find twenty year’s of presents if Stiles would just stay in Beacon Hills from here on out.  Proximity could be enough.

Stiles snorts.  ”You have four years of presents?”  He didn’t buy Derek’s  _yes_.  An eyebrow goes up.  He pokes Derek in the center of his chest.  No, not a poke, a press of a finger.  "I like puzzles."

Chris wants to talk about France, and Stiles is pulled away.  He's licking his lip again as he leaves.

****

Derek needs air.  

He looks up at the constellation through the trees.  It has kept him company for so long, he wonders if the flesh-and-blood Stiles is even real.  None of the heat had subsided from that interrupted moment before Stiles left for France so long ago.  If anything it had grown _more_ persistent, _more_ heavy, _more_ urgent.

Behind him the door opens and softly closes.  Derek keeps his eyes on the night sky as Stiles settles in beside him along the porch rail.  Minutes pass.  Derek feels like he needs to change his skin and run.

"The trees are blocking my favorite," Stiles says.  "Grand Chien."

Derek laughs, unexpected and real, grateful to be near Stiles again.

"Well, what else would it be?  I’m in fucking _France_ for four years to learn a bunch of druid werewolf magic  _merde_.  Those stars are basically tattooed on my brain.”

"It’s perfect," Derek smiles, bumping his shoulder into Stiles’.  

"What’s yours then, puzzle-wolf?"

"Puzzle-wolf?"

Stiles shrugs against Derek’s shoulder. “I like puzzles.”

Derek turns away from the stars and looks at Stiles’ then.  The constellation that kept Derek’s thoughts for four years is lit in the moonlight.

"Mine’s here," Derek says, voice rough and nervous as he leans in.  He runs his lips from the first to the last, barely able to distinguish Stiles’ shiver from his own.

"So about that," Stiles breathes.  "Monastery life is _so_ not for me.  I’ve got 48 long-ass months to convince me."

Hope shines bright inside Derek's chest.  He presses a hand against Stiles’ lower back, leaving his lips against Stiles’ cheek. 

"How about we—"  And Stiles squirms in Derek’s embrace until Derek is pressed against the rail and Stiles’ mouth is on his.  The heat of his skin bleeds through his clothes and into Derek’s touch.  The force of him — all of him: his scent, his magic, his body, the way Derek needed him for so long — throbs in rhythm with Derek’s heart.  Every muscle in Stiles' body is taut.  They are closer than toe-to-toe, but it's still a provocation.  Derek smiles into Stiles' touch.  He'd missed Stiles and how he wheedled his way into things, how he'd wheedled his way into Derek's heart.

When Stiles pulls back, he is breathless and grinning.  His fingers trace Derek’s smile.  

“ _Fuck_.  _Yes_.  I’ve been waiting for four years in a freaking _monastery_ to finish that.  And this,” Stiles smirks, stepping away and backing down the porch stairs onto the dirt.  "Chase me."

****

Derek howls his thanks to the stars while Stiles laughs beside him, steam rolling from their cooling skin.

To the stars, four years is just an instant.


End file.
